Jul 6, 2012

Back in England, the Hansom
cab was a kind of two wheel horse-drawn carriage designed and
patented in 1834 by Joseph Hansom, an architect from York. The
vehicle was developed and tested by Hansom in Hinckley,
Leicestershire, England. Originally called the Hansom Safety Cab,
Hansom's design was modified by John Chapman (not Johnny Appleseed
and not Dallas' John Chapman) and several others to improve its
practicability, but retained Hansom's name. Hansom also set up a
company in New York in 1869.

Hackney was an area of London, England and before Hansoms, hackney
was also a name for carriages for hire to get around the city. It is
also where we get the name 'hack' for modern cab drivers.

Harry Nathaniel Allen of The New York Taxicab Co., who imported the
first 600 gas-powered New York taxicabs from France, coined the word
"taxicab" as a contraction of "taximeter cabriolet", with cabriolet
reflecting the design of the carriage.

There are essentially four distinct forms of taxicab, which can be
identified by slightly differing terms in different countries:

1 - Hackney carriages, also known as public hire, hailed or street
taxis, licensed for hailing on the street. Hansom's were Hackneys.
2 - Private hire vehicles, also known as minicabs or private hire
taxis, licensed for pre-booking only.
3 - Taxibuses, also known as Jitneys, operating on preset routes
typified by multiple stops and multiple independent passengers.
4 - Limousines, specialized vehicle licensed for operation by
pre-booking.

Taxi service is typically provided by automobiles, but various
human-powered vehicles, such as the rickshaw or pedicab and
animal-powered vehicles, or boats, such as water taxis or gondolas
are also used

The first taxi service in Toronto was established in 1837 by
Thornton Blackburn, an ex-slave from the US. He designed and built a
red and yellow box cab named 'The City', drawn by a single horse,
and able to carry four passengers, with a driver in a box at the
front, which he, himself, would operate. It became the nucleus of a
taxicab company, the city's first, a successful venture

The firm Checker, which also made cars in addition to the eponymous
cabs, came into existence back then, and stopped manufacturing cabs
in 1982. It continued operation at partial capacity making Cadillac
parts for General Motors until January 2009 when it declared
bankruptcy.